Bradley Tyler Johnson

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Bradley T. Johnson

Bradley Tyler Johnson (September 29, 1829 – October 5, 1903) was an American lawyer, soldier, and writer. He served as a general in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War.

Johnson was born in Frederick City, Maryland, a son of Charles Worthington Johnson and Eleanor Murdock Tyler.^[1] He graduated from Princeton in 1849, read law with William Ross of Frederick, and finished his legal degree at Harvard. He was admitted to the bar in 1851.

On June 23, 1851, he married Jane Claudia Saunders of North Carolina (a daughter of Hon. Romulus Mitchell Saunders and granddaughter of Judge William Johnson).^[2] Their son, Bradley Saunders Johnson was born on February 14, 1856.

Johnson was a delegate to the National Democratic Convention at Baltimore in 1860 and joined the majority of his delegation when they withdrew from the convention and united with the Southern wing of the party, which supported Breckenridge and Lane.

When the Civil War began, Johnson organized and equipped a company at his own expense, and he took an active part in forming the 1st Maryland Infantry, of which he became major and subsequently colonel, meanwhile declining a lieutenant colonel's commission in a Virginia regiment because of his belief that his strongest obligation was to his own state. He saw service in the Seven Days Battles around Richmond in 1862 and was advanced to the rank of brigadier general of cavalry in 1864.

As commander of the post at Salisbury, N.C., he used his influence to lessen the suffering among the prisoners of war and finally obtained their parole.

After the war, he practiced law in Richmond until 1879, when he moved to Baltimore. After the death of his wife, he moved to Amelia, Virginia, where he died.

His writings include:

Reports of Chase's Decisions on the Fourth Circuit (1875)
Memoir of Joseph E. Johnston (1891)
Foundation of Maryland and the Maryland Act Concerning Religion (1883)
Life of General Washington, in "Great Commanders Series" (1894)
Maryland in Confederate Military History (Atlanta, 1899)

[edit] References

This article incorporates text from an edition of the New International Encyclopedia that is in the public domain.
Hanson, George Adolphus, Old Kent: the Eastern Shore of Maryland , Notes Illustrative of the Most Ancient Records of Kent County, 1876.